news. very smart. donald trump is singing vladamir putin's praises after the russian leader said that he won't order tit for tat expulsions of american diplomats. tonight, he seems to be counting on the president-elect to reverse the new u.s. sanctions. forced out. russians who got the boot from president obama are on the move, as the sanctions sink in. why is putin refusing to respond in kind? we'll have a live report from moscow. boxed in. a top trump aide suggests president obama ordered sanctions to try to force the hand of his successor. the president-elect has been huddling with high level advisers as he faces a big decision on russia once he's sworn in. also, convicted again. a cousin of the kennedy political dynasty may be heading back to prison after a new ruling that his murder trial was fair after all. this hour, another dramatic twist in a sensational case that's been on and off for some four decades. we want to welcome our

viewers here in the united states and around the around. wolf blitzer is off today. i'm jim sciutto. you are in "the situation room." >> this is cnn breaking news. >> the breaking news tonight, president-elect trump is applauding vladamir putin for brushing off new u.s. sanctions against russia. the kremlin leader saying he will not expel american diplomats after president obama ordered 35 russians to leave the country as punishment for election related hacking. in a tweet, trump is praising putin's "great move," adding that he always knew putin was very smart. russians are starting to feel the impact of the sanctions, with people leaving a diplomatic compound that was forced to close and heading to the russian embassy. today, some experts suggest that moscow's muted response is a classic putin move, designed to manipulate and even surprise. as the drama plays out, president-elect trump is facing

a decision about whether to keep or lift the sanctions once he takes office in three weeks. top adviser kellyanne conway telling cnn that president obama may have taken action against russia to box in trump. i'll talk about all this with the top democrat on the house armed services committee. he's standing by along with our correspondents and analysts, as we bring you full coverage of the day's top stories. evens president-elect trump praises putin, the russian leader is throwing another curveball at the u.s. tonight, russians vacating compounds shut down by the u.s. russian president vladamir putin, however, dismissing washington's payback. instead, wishing president obama and his family a happy new year, saying in a statement "we will not stoop to the level of irresponsible diplomacy. sit it is a pity president obama

administration finishes his work this way. serge lavrov recommending putin expel 35 american diplomats from russia after 35 russian spies were ordered to leave the u.s. by this weekend. >> translator: we cannot let such escapades happen without a response. the russian foreign ministry, together with colleagues from other departments, have made a proposal to declare 31 tstaff from the embassy of moscow as pena nongrata. >> reporter: president putin said in a statement, we will not create problems for american diplomats. we will not send anyone away. with a stroke of drama, putin even issued this invitation to american children, in response to the new u.s. sanctions, i invite all children of the u.s. diplomats to the new year and christmas children's show at the

kremlin. signed vladamir putin. the u.s. shut down two russian government owned compounds, one in new york where law enforcement was seen outside. and another in maryland, a 45-acre property purchased by the soviet government in 1972. today, vehicles were seen returning to the russian embassy in washington. the russians working at the compounds were spying on the u.s. >> what these individuals were doing is basically collecting intelligence. they're intelligence officers operating here and using these compounds, one in new york, one in maryland, for intelligence collection purposes. >> reporter: russia, however, refutes that the estates were being used for espionage. >> i think it's quite scandalous they chose to go after our own kids. they know those two facilities which they mentioned, they're vacation facilities or our kids. and this is christmastime. >> reporter: four of the russians sanctioned by the u.s. are part of the russian military intelligence unit, known as the

gru. >> it's assigning blame to russia's military intelligence service, but the actual perpetrators of these hacks are contractors, people who have been found by the russian government to do their dirty work for them. >> reporter: let's go live to russia for more on vladamir putin's response to the u.s. sanctions and the kudos that he's getting on twitter from donald trump. correspondent matthew chance is live in moscow. so what are you hearing there tonight? >> reporter: well, i mean, the russian media are absolutely euphoric about this. this was a remarkable bit of drama on the part of donald trump. you heard serge lavrov recommending that 35 u.s. diplomats be expelled in response to the 35 russian diplomats being expelled. it gave vladamir putin the opportunity to show that he's magnanimous and take the high road and say no, i'm not going to make life difficult for these

diplomats. i'm not going to expel anyone. he also extended that invitation to the children of u.s. diplomats to spend new year at the kremlin. he turned around a serious rebuke from the united states a positive for him, sweeping to one side the obama administration and reaching across it, directly appealing to the incoming administration of donald trump, saying look, the future of u.s. policy with u.s.-russian relations is going to be the policy that donald trump has. and that was something that was appreciated by at least one person, by donald trump who tweeted himself from his estate in florida saying, great move in delaying this by vladamir putin. i always knew he was very smart. so vladamir putin must be very happy with his work today. >> let's look through all the theater here, that serious statement by the foreign minister who had to have known what his president was going to do afterwards, reaching out. this is really a russian

leadership knowing that they ear going get a much friendlier president in three weeks' time. >> yeah, and it's also the russian leadership that knows donald trump faces a lot of head winds from his own party, the republicans that want to crack down harder on russia and establish more sanctions. this was perhaps an attempt to disarm them and to help donald trump in maintaining his stance. because they need a friendly white house. they need donald trump here in the kremlin, because they want sanctions lifted. they want the united states to get involved with the peace process that they've established in syria to bring an end to the conflict there in russia's favor. they want all sorts of other issues that have divided united states and russia over the past couple of years. they see donald trump as the best chance of them doing that. >> matthew chance in moscow, thank you very much. tonight, president-elect trump's glowing tweet about vladamir putin may be a hint at what he plans to do about those new u.s. sanctions once he takes office.

cnn's sunlen serfaty is with trump in florida. we're getting a collection of signals as to what president-elect trump is going to do once he takes office. >> reporter: that's right, jim. president-elect donald trump has not said firmly what he's going to do with these sanctions, whether he will reverse them or leave them in place. but the tone of the tweets and the statements coming from donald trump tonight is certainly sending a very distinct message. tonight, president-elect donald trump is out with new praise for vladamir putin, applauding the russian president for withholding retaliatory sanctions on the u.s., trump tweeting great move by vladamir putin. i always knew he was very smart. but as the president-elect determines his next move responding further to russia and the new u.s. sanctions, his advisers are calling out the

obama administration for what they see as politics as play. >> we've been talking about this for a while. i think that all we heard all through the election was "russia, russia, russia," when it came to anything donald trump said or did most days. now since the election, it's this fever pitch of accusations and insinuations. >> reporter: trump transition officials are speculating that the administration sanctions against russia are a distraction to undermine his wins and tie his hands on russia before he becomes president. >> i will tell you even those sympathetic to president obama on most issues are saying part of the reason he did this was to "box in president-elect trump." that would be very unfortunate if politics were the motivating factor here. >> reporter: since the sanctions were announced, trump has only issued a two-line statement thursday night, saying in part "it's time for our country to move on to bigger and better things." a posture he has taken publicly

in recent days. >> i think we ought to get along with our lives. i think computers have complicated lives very greatly. the whole age of computer has made it where nobody knows exactly what's going on. >> reporter: but the president-elect has now agreed to sit down with the intelligence community. >> we just need to get to a point ourselves where we can talk to all of these intelligence agencies and find out once and for all what evidence is there, how bad is it? >> reporter: that closed door meeting likely to take place in new york next week, where trump will be presented with the evidence that the intel community says points a finger at russia for the tacks. >> maybe at that time or maybe later, he'll have a response. but right now, we're just not in the position to sit here and respond to all of these details before we have a full-blown intelligence report on this particular matter. >> reporter: in the past, trump and his aides have publicly been

skeptical of the intelligence community's conclusions. >> i don't think anybody knows it was russia that broke into the dnc. it could be somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds. >> reporter: and vowing during the campaign to improve the relationship with russia. >> wouldn't it be nice if we actually got along with russia and these other countries? wouldn't that be a positive thing? >> reporter: once sworn in, trump has the power to reverse the sanctions or keep them in place. that decision hanging in the balance tonight. all of this continues to play out on twitter this evening, after trump posted that tweet this afternoon, it was only a matter of minutes before the russian embassy and the u.s. retweeted that praise from donald trump for russian president vladamir putin. >> sunlen, thank you very much. in the last hour, we got republican reaction. i want to hear now from a democrat. we're joined by congressman john

ger gerumendi. first to this tweet from donald trump, saying great move on the day by vladamir putin. i always knew he was very smart. can you give me your reaction? >> i am very scared that our next president hasn't a clue about what russia is actually up to. doesn't he recognize what happened in georgia years ago? not so many years ago. to crimea and in the ukraine? does he know about the overflights of the russian planes against our ships in the baltic sea? has he no clue at all about russia trying to undermine nato and do away with the one protection that we've had since world war ii, to protect western europe from an aggressive russia? doesn't he understand what he's playing into here?

does he know that his secretary of state wants to do away with the sanctions that have been imposed by the european union as well as the united states against russia for their invasion of crimea, take overof crimea, as well as the actions they have taken in eastern ukraine? this is very serious stuff and our new president can marching out there with naivety or else trying to do away with the american safety in europe for more than 50 years. sit a frightening situation. >> are you concerned that the president-elect is putting the united states' national security at risk? >> absolutely. absolutely true. and the sanctions -- listen, tillerson, exxon's ceo, has been against the sanctions that have been imposed by both europe and the united states against russia. now, just giving putin an open

road would be extraordinarily dangerous. and we know for a fact that putin wants to destabilize the european union and certainly nato. this has been a long-term goal of putin. why would he want to do that? so they can play whatever game they want in eastern europe, to once again dominate eastern europe as they did during the soviet period. this is a very serious situation, which i believe the next president is naive, and oh, my, we're going to go do an intelligence briefing now, next week? he's been offered intelligence briefings since even before he was elected in the november election, and mostly refused to do that. this is not a political play by the obama administration. this is what we needed to do, and that is to smack russia as best we could with these issues

that have been taking place. by the way -- >> let me ask you on that, because the obama administration has been accused of boxing trump in. and to be fair, it was october 7 that the intelligence community identified russia as being behind this hacking, a full month before the election. the obama administration had enormous opportunity to take action like this weeks, even months ago. why just now? >> it probably took some time to figure out exactly what would be the best way. also note there were four individuals being accused of a federal crime, and there's money on their head for somebody to give us the information so that we can retrieve those individuals and prosecute them here in the united states. this is a serious breach of american law. it is a crime to hack into a system, to steal information. >> but i -- to be fair, i do have to ask you this, because listen, it was already on october 7 that the intelligence community said they were

confident, they went public in a statement saying we are confident russia hacked the election. you know better than me, the intelligence community doesn't do that unless they have the goods. why did the president need to wait 2 1/2 month it is he had the goods then? it gives credence to what trump and his supporters say that he's only doing it now because trump is the president-elect. >> certainly the trump transition team wants to play this as though it is some sort of political game, tit for tat. no, this is something really serious. this is about a federal crime, hacking into the dnc and probably dozens of other people. whether it was leaked for political issues or not, it is still a crime. and you have to be aware of what is being played out here, and that is that our next president is cozying up to the russians, maybe providing them with an

excuse to continue their nefarious schemes, undermining nato, and also literally invading, not literally, actually invading other countries. invading georgia. invading ukraine. taking over crimea. this is serious business, and our president has to stand up to them. yes, absolutely, we want to have a better relationship, but don't back down and don't ever approach russia with weakness and kindness and a wet kiss. >> congressman, stand by. i want to ask you about putin's next move. we'll come right back after this break. (vo) a lifetime of your dog's nutritional needs... all in one. purina one. healthy energy, all in one. strong muscles, all in one. highly digestible, and a taste he loves, all in one. purina one smartblend is expertly blended... with 100% nutrition, 0% fillers, always real meat #1. lifelong smart nutrition. it's all in one. purina one.

we're back with congressman john gerumendi.

congressman, expulsions like we're seeing now so common during the cold war. are we entering or have we entered a second cold war? >> well, last week our president-elect said he wanted to start a nuclear arms race. this week he -- i don't know, goes opposite direction and wants to make love to putin. so where is this man going? what is his position? what is he going to do when russia sends his little green men into estonia, a nato country that we're there to defend? this is scary, scary stuff. i'm not at all sure what the new president-elect wants to do. he's not negotiating a new hotel deal. he's negotiating international relationship with what our generals believe to be the existential threat to the united states, russia. this is not something to be taken lightly, and certainly avoiding intelligence briefings over the last month and a half is just not what should be done.

>> so what is -- what is vladamir putin's next move? is he waiting to read donald trump's actual actions once he takes office? >> what he ought to be reading now is that a man one week threatening a nuclear arms race and the next week giving putin a big, wet kiss. what's going on here? what is the position of this new president? and what is he trying to achieve? does he really want to do away with nato? does he really want japan and others to have nuclear weapons? you can't be on multiple sides of issues here. you have to be clear. you're dealing with a very dangerous situation. are we to ignore what russia did in syria and aleppo? i suppose so. this is -- this is a very difficult and a very dangerous situation. and to simply say that the obama administration is playing politics ignores the underlying reality of what has transpiring here.

russia hacked into the democratic party, into the chairman of the campaign, and then leaked that information for political purposes. it is a crime. and russia was clearly engaged in that. so what are you going to do, just stand aside and do nothing? the president of the united states is responsible for carrying out the authority of the united states and prosecuting criminals. russia is a criminal. >> congressman, thank you very much for taking the time today. >> thank you. just ahead, more on the new trump tweet and what it tells us about his plans for russia once he's sworn in. and a member of the kennedy family may be heading back to prison. mikele skakel's murder conviction has been reinstated. we'll talk about this notorious case.

breaking tonight. donald trump is responding to a surprise move by vladamir putin with words of praise. the kremlin leader says he will not expel american diplomats, at least not now. despite new u.s. sanctions for russia's election meddling. president-elect trump tweeting, great move on the delay by v. putin. i always knew he was very smart! so you've heard from trump supporters in particular questioning just how certain they are that russia did this.

why do you believe intelligence agencies believe they know who did this? >> one thing they can do is read this 13-page report in the homeland security, the fbi, which has a lot of technical data showing exactly how they say the gru and the fsb broke into the dnc, the democratic national committee, beginning in 2015. it shows you the malware code, the so-called signatures they used to get into these systems. look, if you don't want to believe this and you don't believe -- it doesn't matter what proof is shown to you, but the russians have asked for this, donald trump has asked for this, the people around him have asked for this proof. this document is pretty useful. i know experts who spent the night poring over this document, looking at the ip addresses and all the technical data.

it goes beyond the dnc. if you read the report yesterday from the administration, they're saying the russians have been doing this for ten years or so and it goes beyond the dnc. it goes to critical infrastructure. the united states nuclear power plants. so a lot of people are looking at this data, trying to now find the -- >> vulnerabilities in their system. the past two presidents, republican and democrat, bush and obama, entered office of better relations with russia. obama had the reset, ends where we are now. putin and trump, any potential for this ending warmly, ending as warmly as it started? >> it's going to start warmer. if i could just add one thing, i was in there reading the intelligence for three years, all the intelligence very closely. obviously i can't talk about it. but i also worked for almost ten years on north korea, also reading all the intelligence.

we have excellent intelligence on russia. it's different than many other countries. also in the case of this country it's different. >> they're not doing a lot of guessing when it comes to this. >> right, so i feel very confident having been in there and also this unanimous statement. but back to your question, i think it's going to start very warm, because donald trump has made it very clear it's going to start very warm, so has putin. but i don't think it's going to end very warm unless donald trump really sells the farm, if you will. because we have real interests at stake. our allies have real interest at stake. so i'm leaving out the whole issue of congress pushing back on him. and congress, while they can't make the president do thing, we saw that under obama, congress can block the president. >> it seems like there's a consensus there, even with republicans. if putin doesn't get what he wants from trump or as much as he wants, does he turn on him?

>> well, if i can first, jim, let me jump on what evalyn just said. my last job as commander in europe, i used to get that intel black book every morning. for two years, i stud yesterday p -- studied putin and his army on a daily basis. is putin going to get what he wants? he's playing this according to one of his generals came up. they are right in line with nonlinier warfare and cyber warfare, sewing mistrust and misunderstanding of your enemy. when he turned this morning and said no, i'm santa claus putin, you can all come to the kremlin and watch my shows, he was doing exactly what he needed to do, because he was first of all stroking trump's ego. secondly, he was trying to portray himself as the good guy, the better of the two between

himself and mr. obama, because he was actually inviting people in and not doing a tit for tat. and third, he was sewing more distrust and driving a bigger wedge between mr. trump and the intelligence community, and his fellow republicans. this is right in line with what mr. trump wants to do, and he's playing -- i'm sorry, mr. putin wants to do and he's playing trump like a fiddle. >> peter, enormous political theater here. >> yeah. and we'll see how it all plays out. donald trump has a dilemma i think, which is -- he can either go along with these sanctions and expulsions and concede that obama and the intelligence community is correct or he can reverse them. i think reversing them would be very strange and unusual. so let's see. >> we've seen strange and unusual. thank you very much, peter, evan, evalyn and mark. great to have you on. just ahead, the new ruling in a

sensational murder case involving a cousin of the kennedys.

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breaking news tonight. a murder conviction reinstated for a member of the kennedy family. the connect supreme court ruling that michael skakel did receive a fair trial when he was convicted in 2002 of killing martha moxley. skakel was released from prison

in 2013 when a lower court ruled that his legal defense has been deficie deficient. he may have to return to prison now for the killing of moxley back in 1975. jeffrey toobin is on the phone with us. he's covered skakel's trial and knows it well. tell us how we got here to the e instate of the vermont. >> after he was convicted in 2002, he went through his appeals all the way up to the connecticut supreme court and remained convicted. however, he then petitioned a state court for what's called a writ of habeas corpus on the grounds that his defense attorney gave him ineffective assistance of counsel. the court granted that petition, ordered him released from prison. but the state of connecticut

appealed to the connecticut supreme court. today, the connecticut supreme court reinstated his conviction, so if the status quo remains, he will be ordered back to prison. >> you've been in that courtroom for days are through this trial. do you believe the evidence was convincing? >> i do. i think the court that whereabogranted the motion was wrong. mickey sherman was a competent lawyer. he made some difficult choices about who to blame for the real murder, but it was a constitutionally permissible defense. i think the jury was correct in its ruling. i think the judge was correct in upholding the ruling, that is the trial court judge. and i think justice was done here. you know, i think it's worth noting that the only reason this case was brought all these years

later was my great friend and colleague dominic dunn of "vanity fair" drew attention with it. >> jeffrey toobin, thank you very much. fascinating case. i want to turn now back to donald trump, his transition, his relationship with vladamir putin, and we're joined by our political panel, . douglas, i want to take advantage of the fact that you spoke with president-elect trump just on wednesday, face to face in florida. did he say anything to you about russia, his plans for russia, rebooting relations with russia? >> no. i didn't even mention the name of putin to him. but i did talk about precedents. it dawned on me the precedents that donald trump talks about a lot, ronald reagan, who had famous diplomacy with mikhail

gorbachev, john f. kennedy, who had the showdown with russia, but also was trying to do the famous nuclear test ban treaty with the soviet union in the early '60s and wanted to go to the moon with russia at one point. but he's somebody looking out of the box for a big breakthrough in the international arena, to change what in donald trump's mind is the gridlock. so i think he can go in any direction. nuclear arms increase or reductions in the coming years. >> doug, trump is coming into office as one of the most unpopular president-elects in recent history. let's look at the poll. his approval rating before taking office, 41%. compare that to obama, george w. bush, slightly higher. clinton and bush in the 60s. he has a short leash with voters, you might say, based on those numbers. what happens, does it matter if

that approval rating continues to decline? >> oh, it could matter and it does matter greatly. he's got to somehow build some momentum heading into his inauguration. as your program has been pointing out, russia is going to be at the forefront of things. john mccain and lindsey graham are just basically attack dogs on donald trump's view of russia. so it's going to be hard to see how he gets that number to go over 50 and 60% approval without successfully navigating through a type of crisis we don't want. further making it difficult that the economy takes any dip downward, it's pretty good now. the stock market has been high. unemployment at good levels. he'll be held accountable very early on. so he'll have to find something out of the gate beyond picking a republican supreme court. he's got to find an american issue that he can bring another

10 or 15% to him. ronald reagan always said don't operate below 50%. right now trump is below it. >> rebecca, is this a good strategy for trump? he's got his own party against him on russia. you're going to have a report coming out from the white house just before the inauguration, you're going to have hearings, measures voting on the hill that all talk about russia's interference and penalties for it. why is that going to make it more popular? >> donald trump is not uncomfortable being the odd man out. that's where he's been for the duration of his political career now. and he did all right, he won the election. so i don't think that the republicans speaking out against him are necessarily going to be damaging. but it does become damaging if there are repercussions, consequences that the american people can see and dislike. and i think that's where he will be judged on his relations with

russia and more broadly his foreign policy. are there outcomes that are good for americans or bad for americans? obviously donald trump is betting that strengthening relations with russia and to use his terms, negotiating a deal with them, will have good consequences for america. many americans and republicans and democrats alike are warning that that's not so simple. >> jackie, if you look at obama's actions in recent days, you can understand the republican argument that they say obama is trying to tie trump's hands. you look at the russian sanctions, this u.n. security council resolution on israel, his push next week on the hill to save obamacare, is there substance to that? >> i think two things are going on. one, the obama administration thought hillary clinton was going to win. so they didn't think they had to cross all these ts and dot all these is before january 20th. the other thing at play is yeah, he's trying to tie his hands both politically in a lot of

ways, but when you talk about some of the drilling regulations that he put in, that will tie him up in court. so there are some obstacles that he's put in his way to try to save his legacy. and also just trying to preserve some of the things that he's done, and when it comes to russia, it's like he's trying to slow down the process. this is an executive action, he can swipe it away his first day in office. that will create a lot of heartburn on the hill with hill republicans and democrats. so a little of a trip wire for him. >> no question. it's going to be a battle. thank you very much. we'll have much more news just after this.

there are now just about 29 hours left in one of the most tumultuous election years in american history. many americans are still feeling the after shocks from one bombshell after another. dana bash looks at the top ten political moments of 2016. ♪ >> reporter: controversial, unprecedented and unexpected. 2016 was an election year for the ages, with an ending to disrupt washington, and that it

did. the fight for the gop presidential nomination hit new lows in 2016, as republicans scrambled to beat front-runner donald trump at his own game. >> and you know what they say about men with small hands. you can't trust them. you can't trust them. >> reporter: the insults got under trump's skin. >> he referred to my hands, if they're small, something else must be small. i guarantee there's no problem. >> reporter: but nothing could knock the billionaire from the top spot. >> all right, everybody. >> reporter: in a remarkable display of gop hesitation and consternation about donald trump, house speaker paul ryan, the top republican in government, refused to endorse the resuchtive gop presidential nominee. >> to be candid, jake, i'm just not ready to do that at this point. i'm not there right now. >> reporter: then touche.

trump parroted ryan's language. >> i like paul, but these are horrible times for our country. we need very strong leadership. we need very, very strong leadership and, i'm just not quite there yet. >> reporter: ryan did eventually offer trump a tepid endorsement with their nominee persistent through election day. en. >> on the democratic side. >> you could put half of trump's supporters into what i call the basket of deplorable. right? the racist, sexist, home phobic, z xenophobic. islam phobic. >> trump and his supporters embraced the moniker. >> remember what hillary clinton said, basket of deplorables? what? >> months of interparty fighting

culminated in two history conventions. each party tried to repair the rifts before the general election. in cleveland a public display of gop disunity. trump's former rival senator cruz was invited to speak but refused to endorse the nominee. >> stand and speak and vote your conscience. >> trump stole cruz's thunder. appearing in the middle of the family box in the speech. and then it was amir khan. >> let me asks you. have you even read the united states constitution? i will gladly lend you my copy. >> trump took the bait, going after the gold star family in interviews and on twitter and

handing hillary a post convention lead. for president obama 2016 was personal. >> donald is not really a plans guy. he's not really a facts guy either. >> reporter: obama e vised trump on the campaign trail and trump hit bac >> president barack obama was born in the united states, period. >> then there were the debates. the candidates performances in three face-to-face fights for must see tv for voters. clinton used the match-ups to lure trump off message. >> he called this woman miss piggy, then he called her miss housekeeping because she was latina. donald she has a name. >> where did you find this --

>> donald her name is i alicia. >> reporter: but trump successfully painted clinton ads mor of the same. >> she's been doing this thirty years. >> and october brought an unwelcome surprise for the trump campaign. infamous caught on tape momentum from a 2005 "access hollywood" appearance where the republican nominee is heard making extremely lewd comments about women. >> and when you are a star they let you do it. you can do anything. those words let to a string of accusations from women saying that trump had sexual assaulted them. with only weeks until the election it seemed like the contest might be over. but in a stunning move fbi director james comey broke precedent by taking action eleven days before the election and handed the clinton campaign their own october surprise.

comey had more power than usual since attorney general loretta lynch was compromised after bill clinton boarded her plane during the investigation into the hillary clinton's e-mails. comey decided not to bring charges in june. but then he sent a letter to congress a week and a half before the election saying the fbi was looking into additional e-mails discovered on anthony weiner's home computer. >> it is incumbent upon the fbi to tell us what they are talking about. >> her team points directly to his actions as a key reason for her loss. >> i accept your nomination for president of the united states. >> after trying in 2008, hillary clinton did make history in 2016. becoming the first female presidential nominee of a major political party. still her heartbreak was palpable when she spoke about falling short of the historic benchmark she failed to reach.

>> i know we have still not shattered that highest and hardest glass ceiling. but someday someone will. and hopefully sooner than we might think right now. >> for the political world tow 16 will be remembered with one head-spinning day. november 8th. >> cnn can report that hillary clinton has called donald trump to concede the race. she has called donald trump to say that she will not be president. even donald trump himself appeared surprised. >> as i've said from the beginning, ours was not a campaign but rather a movement. >> voters certainly called for change in 2016. the test for 2017 is whether donald trump, a first-time politician and unconventional candidate and president elect can deliver his promise to fix washington. >> to ow viewers check out the

first ever book from cnn politics. "unprecedented, the election that changed everything." in stores and online at cnn.com/book. ring in 2017 with the lengdry ban chick. the history extending more than fifty years. poppy harlow met up with chicago and some of its ridoriginal mems on tour. have a look. >> reporter: after 47 golden platinum records dozens of al mums and more than 1 hundred million albums sold, chicago is still rocking today. a brotherhood started with a handshake nearly fifty years ago. >> a harnd shake and a jam session. >> did you ever imagine? >> no. none of us did.

>> to have this success for this long is unprecedented. >> so when was the pinch me moment? >> we're still having it. >> so poppy do you want to back up on stage. >> we caught one chicago on the final leg of their tour in omaha nebraska. >> omaha, the hell are you? >> as the true band. a band of brothers. >> at some point e i think we all realized that music is indeed what we're going to be doing pretty much for the rest of our lives. >> the music talent is amalzing. tran sends all ages. zblm. >> there have been decades wilder than others, like their years of the caribou ranch.

>> it happened to be very close to a college of town. there was a ton of drugs. really good drugs. and it ended up just kind of being a party in the rockies. >> chicago was flying high but then came their heartbreak. original guitarist died suddenly, accidentally shooting himself. >> that made -- cut us short and we didn't know what we were doing to do. >> you said you were still working through his death. >> yeah. >> decades later. >> to be honest with you i give terry a look every night when he play saturday in the park. there is a lyric in there that refers to him. ♪ a man playing guitar ♪ and singing for us all

>> i still dream about terry. >> he was like the musical leader of the band at the time. he would want us to stay together as well. >> you loved him. >> um-hmm. he was very lovable. >> they did they say what terry would have wanted. they stayed together and kept playing. chicago has toured every single year of its existence. >> please welcome, chicago! ♪ >> and finally in 2016 the ultimate honor. >> it is my honor to finally induct chicago into the rock and roll hall of fame. >> but no sign these rockers are slowing down. not even for a second. >> i've always contended that music, creating music keeps me in a childlike state. and it is not too bad. ♪ we want it to be as organic as it started out being, and that is why we're still together.

>> poppy harlow, cnn, omaha. >> now more than ever the history of the band chicago airs new year's day on cnn here at 8:00 p.m. from all of us a sincere very happy new year to you. erin burnett "outfront" start right now. "outfront" next. donald trump praising vladimir putin, calling the russian president smart for not retaliating against the u.s. plus who's playing whom. and attempts to block trump before he gets to the white house. and a member of the mormon tabernacle choir quits rather than sing in trump's inauguration. let's go "outfront." i'